For the second time this month, a woman has died after being doused with a flammable liquid and set on fire.
Margarita Ceceña Martínez of Cuautla, Morelos, died in a Mexico City hospital on Sunday, 23 days after she was attacked by a family member in her home, part of which is a small grocery store.
Her death followed that of Luz Raquel Padilla, a Jalisco woman who passed away last Tuesday after she was doused with alcohol and set on fire in a park near her home in Zapopan.
Ceceña, her mother and her son were attacked on July 1 in an incident reportedly related to a family dispute over a home. According to a Reforma newspaper report, aggressors arrived at the 30-year-old’s home with sticks, a machete and a container filled with gasoline.
A man identified as Primitivo Rangel – an in-law of the victim – doused Ceceña, her son and Andrea Martínez with gasoline and attempted to set all three alight. Ceceña sustained second and third degree burns to 70% of her body in the attack, while her mother and son managed to avoid being burned.
Ceceña was initially treated in a Cuautla hospital before she was transferred to the National Rehabilitation Institute in southern Mexico City, where she died in the intensive care unit on Sunday. As a result of her death, the Morelos Attorney General’s Office (FGE) will investigate the crime as a femicide. As of late Monday, no one had been arrested in connection with the attack.
Martínez, the victim’s mother, told Milenio Televisión that the FGE advised her that arrest warrants have been issued, but questioned why no one has been detained.
“A month has passed and I haven’t seen them catch those who did this to my daughter,” she said. “The criminals are my sister, my niece and their husbands.”
Martínez said that her daughter had reported threats and previous acts of violence to authorities, but they didn’t take any notice. “Now, she’s dead and they still haven’t acted,” she added.
